Coleman Seeks Court Order To Stop Vote Count
Here's the response from Norm Coleman's campaign to the big news today that the Minnesota state canvassing board sided with Al Franken on re-examining and counting wrongly-rejected absentee ballots: We're taking it to the state Supreme Court.
The Coleman camp is asking the state Supremes to stop any counting of the ballots, delaying it until such time as a standard procedure for reviewing them can be drawn up, which the Coleman camp appears to claim doesn't exist yet -- basically invoking a key legal argument from the Bush v. Gore decision back in 2000.
The problem with this argument: A standard procedure was already set forth by the canvassing board a week and a half ago.
Here's how it works: They've asked the counties to sort the rejected ballots into four piles, one for each of the official legal reasons for rejecting an absentee ballot. What is then left over is the so-called "fifth pile," votes that don't fit any of the reasons under state law for throwing out a ballot -- and those are the ones that the board asked the counties to count today.
There are an estimated 1,600 fifth-pile votes out there, based on some extrapolations, votes that were rejected because of clerical errors. If we assume that those votes are a random sampling of the total pool of absentee votes -- which pre-election polls showed Al Franken winning overall -- then those votes would probably swing the election to Al once they're counted.
It's as yet unknown when when the state Supremes might rule on this, but it doesn't seem too likely that the court will shut down the count. Two of the judges, both of them GOP appointees, are also members of that very canvassing board that voted unanimously to allow the count today. Even if they recused themselves, it's hard to imagine the other judges contradicting them in the middle of an ongoing count.
Deja vu all over again. And on the anniversary, no less.
December 12, 2008 4:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
The system needs to be improved... I guess democracy isn't easy, but its worth fighting for.
December 12, 2008 4:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
what exactly are you suggesting is wrong with system??
December 12, 2008 5:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Republicans - denying your right to vote, again and again.
Go away, Norman.
December 12, 2008 4:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
This has become the Repub battle cry over the past 8 years:
do NOT count all the votes.
They did it in Ohio last week too, and won in our Repub-controlled Supreme Court. However, truth, justice and the American Way won out as the Dems won the close elections in spite of successful GOP voter-suppression efforts.
How very sickening it all is.
December 12, 2008 4:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think the problem is that the county canvassing boards aren't *required* to perform the sorting, which can lead to a situation of some counties complying, while other counties do not. There's your due process problem right there.
December 12, 2008 4:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
BTW, I predicted this
this morning.
December 12, 2008 4:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
A court should require all the counties to sort the rejected absentee ballots, for Equal Protection of the Law.
Similarly, anyone who voted-by-mail but didn't sign the envelope should get a second-chance to sign for Equal Protection of the Law (some counties contacted people who didn't sign and let them come in and do so, other counties didn't.)
December 12, 2008 4:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sure, it's just a recommendation. But the localities certainly know that if they refuse to participate, the next step is a court order.
There's really no sense for a locality to refuse the State's request. Especially when it applies to such a small number of ballots.
If there are any holdout localities, the campaign that feels most harmed by the holdout will certainly seek court action.
December 12, 2008 5:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
I know we shouldn't be surprised - but I still find it almost unbelievable that a US Senator is going to court to prevent the counting of legally cast votes. What kind of sleaziness does it take to argue clerical errors should result in canceling the legitimate votes of thousands of citizens? I guess the answer should be obvious - the party of Karl Rove continues to believe that they have the right to win at any cost, citizens be damned.
I hope the Minnesota (and national) press calls this for what it is - a cynical power grab by Norm Coleman to usurp the right to vote.
December 12, 2008 4:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'm loathe to defend Coleman, but he is not demanding the votes shouldn't be counted. He's asking the court to temporarily suspend counting those votes until guidelines for determining their validity are in place.
Because his request seems well reasoned, most voters probably won't see this as attempt to stop ballots from being counted.
Yet as the Eric's post points out above, since there already is a set of guidelines, Coleman's move is at best a stalling tactic, at worst, an attempt to change those guidelines to favor his side.
December 12, 2008 5:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well he's either gonna make an attempt to change those guidelines or demand that they remain uncounted because the guidelines weren't set down in the election code before November 4th.
What's the political make up of the MN SC anyway?
December 12, 2008 6:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Probably could not write a script like this - no one would believe it?
December 12, 2008 4:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
You Democracy lovers make me sick. Just let the Republicans walk all over you. I've been doing it for years.
December 12, 2008 4:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Norm Coleman, you sad little clown...
Actually, this makes me happy. Coleman wouldn't bother with this unless he felt he had to keep those ballots out.
And, as Kleefeld correctly notes, the counting procedure has already been laid out, so there should be no Bush/Gore redux here.
December 12, 2008 4:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
It would be funny if this backfired on the Coleman campaign and the MN Supreme Court not only added to the standards, but also ordered that EVERY county sort the Rejected Absentee Ballots.
Joe Mansky, Elections Manager of heavily Democratic Ramsey County, is refusing to sort.
Ramsey County includes St. Paul.
December 12, 2008 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
It already has backfired on Coleman. Amazing how America has changed from 2000. I'm a Floridian and still ashamed of my state. Minnesota you have done us proud.
December 12, 2008 4:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wait...I thought there were uniform procedures for deciding which absentee ballots get counted. They're called L-A-W-S. The ballots in question were incorrectly rejected even though they satisfied all the requirements of said L-A-W-S. Am I missing something?
How pathetic is it when you have to disenfranchise people who cast perfectly legal ballots in order to try to win?
Norm, I have news for you. This election wasn't about you. It wasn't about Al Franken. Elections are about voters. It's about their right to choose their elected representatives. Not you - the voters. Get it?
December 12, 2008 4:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
So when does the good Senator get a felony indictment or two for fraud and abuse of power?
December 12, 2008 4:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
My observation is that a politician telling you he just wants all the votes counted is kind of like a lawyer telling you all he wants is a fair jury. He has to say that, but you know it is not really true. I wanted to use a country term for lie, but I don't think I can use that word here
December 12, 2008 5:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
FYI 2 members of the canvassing board are Supreme court judges.
December 12, 2008 5:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
As I commented in an earlier post before I realized this one was up, my favorite money quote from the story by Mark Brunswick, Paul Walsh and Bob Von Sternberg at the Star Tribune: "The campaign said that it feared what it called a chaotic 'Florida situation' and that it is likely to go to the court today."
So remind me again, who was it that created the "chaos" in Florida. Oh, that's right. From the the November 28, 2000 Salon:
Miami protest was carried out by rent-a-rioters flown in by the Republican Party. GOP spokespeople have said that at least 750 Republican activists have been sent into South Florida from around the country to oppose the recount, with the party picking up the tab for a number of them. And last Wednesday, when a gaggle of protesters sprang into action in Miami, those efforts seem to have paid off.
The halt of the Miami-Dade County hand count, where 10,750 ballots remain uncounted -- more than enough to flip the outcome of the Florida election or further buttress George W. Bush's lead in the state -- dealt a devastating blow to Al Gore's presidential campaign.
http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/11/28/miami/
December 12, 2008 5:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
The GOP may not have much luck getting people to volunteer to go to Minnesota in the middle of winter if they want a Brooks Bros. Riot redux. I suspect most of the die-hard Republicans were probably there already once this year for the convention.
December 12, 2008 6:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Follow the career trails of those Brooks Brothers rioters and you will see that they were all rewarded handsomely, both politically and professionally, for their feigned recount rebellion. They are nbo doubt proud of the chaos they created. The past 8 years of unimaginable and irreversible diplomatic disaster only makes them prouder.
When the only authority in charge is chaos itself, expect the R's to win the election by a half point. But put even an infinitesimal increment of oversight into the mix, and they lose by 10. Gosh, I wonder what that proves?
Still, when you ponder the conspicuous absence from the spotlight of the likes of Tom Delay, George Allen, Bill Frist, Trent Lott and many other former leaders of the Republicans, and you wonder just how secure a job in that party might be these days.
December 13, 2008 11:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps, by the time this contest is settled, Coleman will be indicted for money laundering.
December 12, 2008 5:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
L
December 12, 2008 6:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Do you think anyone told Norm that one member of the Canvassing Board, Eric Magnusson, is Chief Justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court?
December 12, 2008 6:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, two members of the Canvassing Board are sitting members of the state Supreme Court. Of course, they will recuse themselves from ruling on a matter they have already acted on in another capacity.
Magnusson, I believe, is a former law partner of Republican governor Tim Pawlenty. Pawlenty and Coleman have been amibitious rivals within the state GOP for over a decade. Norm was the "prize" boar chosen by the national Thug leadership to regain their dominance in Minnesota politics and to be their fair-haired aspirant for national office. Norm has ALWAYS wanted to be President someday.
Twice, Pawlenty stepped aside for Norm, at the behest of Karl Rove. In 1998, both guys wanted to run for Governor--Pawlenty deferred after a word from Rove, and Norm went on to lose, at the last minute, to Jesse "The Body" Ventura in a three-way race. Then in 2002, both guys wanted to run for the US Senate against Paul Wellstone. Again, word from the White House gave the nod to Norm. Tim got to run for Governor as a "consolation prize."
They both got "lucky" in 2002. Wellstone died in a plane crash; and Pawlenty rode a xenophobic, anti-immigrant campaign to a victory albeit with less than 50% of the vote, in another 3-way race . . . (without Jesse, who retired instead of seeking reelection.)
December 12, 2008 7:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
"They both got "lucky" in 2002."
Ax, your quotation marks say it all...
December 13, 2008 11:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why this helps Al is that it forces Norm to be the one who goes to court first. You never look more on the defensive than when you go to court.
So far, Norm has held a p.r. advantage because the provisional recount, subtracting challenged ballots, has shown Norm "up" by 192 votes. The nuance--that this is an incomplete return--is lost to the public at large here, especially with incessant rightie talk-radio propaganda spewing disinformation.
There was a 2nd issue today. The Board indicated it WOULD accept the Hennepin County return including 133 missing ballots, based on the original election night count. This gives Al about 46 votes plurality in that precinct. He'll probably need those votes to get over the top, statewide.
But the legal precedent cited by the Attorney General, saying it was OK to count them, was murky. In the court case she mentioned, from a state legislative recount, the similarly missing votes were accepted at trial---but the decision was reversed on appeal to appellate court. It never reached the state's Supreme Court, so it looks unsettled to me. I'm not a lawyer, though.
December 12, 2008 7:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Remember the rethuglicans on the Supreme Court specifically stated that the ruling only applied to the of the presidency for crusader bunnypants and could not be used as a precedent.
So it will be interesting if this gets up to the SCOTUS and they decide to ignore their own ruling in order to put another rethuglican in office.
It would be curious if the partisan SCOTUS decided, contrary to the votes being count, to appoint norm and then to see if Reid and the D's have the spine to refuse to seat him and call the present SCOTUS for the partisan hacks they are.
December 12, 2008 8:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
The Minnesota Supreme Court has a history of making quick and timely decisions on elections cases. They can turn things around in 24 hours, and they dislike being used to screw up elections.
And we have very good precedent for not sending any aspect of a Minnesota Election into Federal Courts. This is different from a Presidential Election -- it is a state election, and thus stays in Minnesota's courts. The decisions on this date from the contest between Elmer Anderson and Karl Rolvaag in the Governor's election of 1962. It is an 8th Circuit Appeals Court Decision what was sent to the Supreme Court, and they affirmed the 8th decision -- namely a state election gets decided under state law under the jurisdiction of the state courts.
December 12, 2008 10:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hi Sara
Stephen from Mpls here. I miss your posts. Are you preparing any kind of memoir of you involvement in DFL politics? If so, I might be able to help find someone who would be willing to assist. Stephen
December 12, 2008 11:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hannity a couple days ago said if Franken took the count to court, he was stealing the election. Now its Coleman taking the case to court. Hannity? Fair and balanced?
December 13, 2008 11:49 AM | Reply | Permalink